BRAXTON'S SILENCE SHOULD END WITH NEW RECORD DEAL.

Byline: Marilyn Beck & Stacy Jenel Smith

Toni Braxton's hiatus from recording is finally over. The five-time Grammy-winning songstress, who scored multiplatinum successes with her ``Toni Braxton'' and ``Secrets'' albums of 1993 and 1996, has resolved the lengthy legal battle with LaFace Records that's kept her from putting out any new discs. And get this, not only has she made up with LaFace, she has signed a new - and much, much sweeter - deal with the record company that's co-owned by Kenneth ``Babyface'' Edmonds and Antonio ``L.A.'' Reid.

Braxton wraps up her Broadway run as Belle in ``Beauty and the Beast'' at the end of this month and will go right into the studio to begin laying tracks for her next album.

Freeman at work

Morgan Freeman's and Gene Hackman's ``Under Suspicion'' drama is now a go for an early May production start in Puerto Rico. That's the project that the two ``Unforgiven'' castmates have been putting together for the past couple of years, based on the French film ``Gare de Vue.''

Freeman lets us know we shouldn't expect any lighthearted buddy stuff in the feature. ``It's an exercise on the nature of guilt and innocence - very serious,'' he says. He also says, ``I love Gene Hackman - but don't tell him I said that. I don't want him to get a big head.''

Freeman's Revelations Entertainment production company banner unfurls for the first time March 28 with NBC's ``Mutiny.'' He serves as executive-producer on the saga of 1944's so-called Port Chicago Mutiny, when 50 African-American sailors were court-martialed for refusing to work in unsafe munitions-loading conditions - conditions that a month earlier caused an explosion that killed 320 men.

The esteemed actor says making the telepic ``encourages me to do more stories of this ilk. A lot of our history is untold. I got my appetite for history whetted by the movies. This is a good way to do it.'' Michael Jai White, Duane Martin, David Ramsey and Joe Morton star in ``Mutiny.'' Many involved in the production hope it will trigger an expunging of the records of the sailors who were dishonorably discharged half a century ago.

The big-screen scene

Madonna and Rupert Everett begin rehearsals mid-March for ``The Next Best Thing'' - a movie that sounds more like a first best thing considering it has that cast and John Schlesinger at the helm. The feature is slated to begin production the middle of April.

Disney's decided to hold back the release of ``Mumford'' with Ted Danson, Martin Short, Mary McDonnell and Alfre Woodard until September - the better to ``build interest and market it,'' to hear McDonnell tell it. The Lawrence Kasdan feature, once expected this spring, is ``a relationship picture about humanity'' says the actress, who also stars in CBS' ``Replacing Dad'' telepic March 14.

``Mumford'' has a psychotherapist moving into a small town and becoming the repository for everyone's secrets. ``Ted and I are married in it. I'm a housewife addicted to mail-order shopping.'' Danson plays ``a horrible man, and he plays him so well! He didn't back off for a second. He was honestly and courageously reprehensible. But still, it's Ted - and you can't help but like him.''

Casting themselves

Audiences who are moved by Juliette Lewis and Giovanni Ribisi as two mildly retarded people who fall in love in Touchstone's ``The Other Sister'' will find it interesting that the actors asked to be considered for the movie together.

``They'd known each other a long time, and thought they could work well together,'' says producer Alexandra Rose. ``It was a fortunate movement of the universe - Giovanni was in the middle of shooting `Saving Private Ryan' when we were casting, but he flew to L.A. when his wife had a baby. He had two days, and that's when he hurried in to read for us.''

Rose, whose credits include ``Norma Rae'' and ``Frankie & Johnny,'' has a deep emotional stake in ``The Other Sister,'' which opens this week. She was inspired to make the movie by a high-functioning mentally challenged friend. ``I grew up with her, went to school with her. Many of the beats in the movie are concomitant with the beats in her life. She is married,'' says Rose, who joined forces with director Garry Marshall on the feature.

``A lot of us felt the movie had a higher purpose. ... The crux of the story has to do with not placing limitations on anyone we meet.''

With reports by Stephanie DuBois.

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2 Photos

Photo: (1) Toni Braxton

Re-signs with LaFace

(2) Morgan Freeman

An eye toward history